Psalms No.7 My God

I'd like you to help me in the reading of this scripture. So if you've got the authorised version of the Bible, then perhaps on the even-numbered verses you would read. Psalm 42.

As the heart, let me explain to our boys and girls, that's a little animal like a deer, runs very, very quickly. As the heart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My tears have been my meat day and night, while they continually say unto me, where is thy God? Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted in me? Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance.

Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy water spouts, all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me. I will say unto God, my rock, why hast thou forgotten me? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? Why art thou cast down, O my soul? Why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God. Amen.

Now let's read some verses tucked away at the end of the last chapter of the letter to the Philippians. Philippians 4 and the 18th verse. Paul commenting on his own circumstances says, but I have all and abound.

I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you, an odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God. But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Now unto God and our Father be glory for ever and ever.

Amen. Salute every saint in Christ Jesus. The brothers who are with me greet you.

All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are of Jesus' household. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.

But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Now that's a splendid text. I gather that on one of the columns supporting the orphanage that the great Charles Spurgeon had built in London was chiseled these words.

Spurgeon was to discover, as on an even greater scale Muller had in Bristol, that when one involves oneself in philanthropic work for the Lord Jesus, he does supply every need. But of course this does not only refer to movements and large-scale efforts for the expansion of the kingdom of God, but this promise applies to you and to me as individual people. Sidlow Baxter, in an address that he has on this particular text, leads off on a financial illustration and he suggests that from the world of commerce one has a way of opening up this text and appreciating its value.

He says, for instance, that the bank is my God and the check shall supply and the amount all your need and the capital his riches and the bank's headquarters in glory and the signature Christ Jesus. Well that's rather wonderful isn't it? But this morning I do not want to concentrate on the whole of that text but rather lift out the expression my God. For as I reminded you a little while ago, these past Sundays we have been looking at that personal pronoun and certain other nouns that are used to describe the relationship that the believer has to his God and the blessings that accrue to the Christian because he has such an intimate contact with his Father.

You remember we spoke about the term my grace and we realized how God has been gracious to us and then we thought about my helper, a little verse that contains that at the end of the Hebrew epistle. Then last week I overran my time and so I had to spill over to Sunday evening and we concentrated on my Redeemer. Now this morning, my God, as I'm not feeling too good I promise you that I'll not be overrunning my time this morning.

So those of you who like shorter addresses should be well pleased. But here if we can not have quantity but quality, I too shall be pleased as we apply this expression to our own circumstances. My God, the Apostle Paul is writing this letter.

Let me remind you, as a prisoner he's possibly at Rome. Indeed I think he's certainly at Rome and he in no way physically is being compensated by any benevolence on the part of the Roman authorities. The way they treated prisoners in those days was diabolical.

There was no philanthropic work of hospitals or orphanages, let alone a society be brought together as it was last century in this country to improve the lot of the prisoners. Now it's Paul in rather straightened circumstances who uses this phrase, this little term and speaking of the creator of the universe, he says my God. Now what can we work out from this? What do you mean when you use this term? Surely on several occasions, if not more than that, you have employed it.

There was a time in our experience when we were all like Thomas. We did not know the Lord, we did not believe in God. We'd heard of Jesus Christ, we'd heard of his death on the cross, but the fact of his resurrection, that he died to save us, that he wanted to relate in a personal level to you and to me, that to us was incredible, fantastic.

But there was that moment, praise be to God throughout eternity, when the Lord Jesus Christ came on the scene in our lives and like doubting Thomas, it gushed from our mouths the words of recognition, my Lord, my God. Well here I see is Paul using the same expression. What's the intonation imply? What does it imply when you use it? Let me lead off then in trying to answer these questions by putting up one or two observations that strike me from the context and from my own experience in employing this term.

Here I suggest is a measure of amazement, a measure of amazement. My, the man from Tarsus was seeking for God in the seminary at Jerusalem. He had joined the the sect of the Pharisees because he craved a knowledge of God.

Saul or as he later was known Paul did everything he could to get himself into a right relationship with God, but it always seemed to be away from him. He never realized his objective. He was never satisfied until that day on the Damascus road when God unhorsed him, when a great light shone and he was prevented from accomplishing what was his mission when he left Jerusalem.

For there on that connecting road between the capital of Syria and the holy city, the Lord Jesus Christ appeared to the man from Tarsus and he entered into a relationship with Saul. And from that moment on the man who was destined to be an apostle, a missionary, an evangelist to the Gentiles entered into a deep and an intimate relationship with God. And the marvel of it, the wonder of it, it never left him.

You read the last epistles that Paul wrote and there he's referring to himself as the chiefest of sinners, but he also makes allusion to my gospel, the gospel that God gave to him and the fact that God in his infinite grace had separated him from his from his mother's womb and though he was a diabolical sinner and he had persecuted the church of Jesus Christ and had many Christians done to death, Stephen included, nonetheless in the gracious dealings of God, Paul was brought into a relationship with him. And he says, my God, every time we sing that hymn, I don't think it's in hymns of faith, perhaps we had it put in this supplement, I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene. It summons up my feelings that this God should be in such a relationship with me that I can say, my God, how I love to hear our congregation singing with enthusiasm that scripture chorus, thou art my God and I will praise thee.

Thou art my God, I will adore thee. Oh, give thanks unto the Lord for he is good. I say that if you have lost your measure of astonishment that God is your God, then you veered a long way from the biblical faith of our forefathers.

I think I made reference to this some months ago. A. W. Tozer has a chapter in one of his books entitled, Never Lose Your O, O-H, Never Lose Your O. What does Tozer mean? Well, simply this, that you should never lose that sense of amazement that God has a concern for you. I believe that our worship should be exuberant.

I believe that worship should be spontaneous, but never at the price of losing the thought of the majesty and the holiness and the sovereignty of God and that this man, the Lord Jesus Christ, was God's representative who caused a link to be made between me and God, a re-establishment of my relationship. My God, a measure of amazement, I say, is in that term. But again, and no prizes because there's nothing unique from the Word of God that I have to share with you.

This text has been preached on so many occasions that there is nothing new to be said. But let me underline something else that is obvious in this word. Not only the measure of amazement, but the thought of possession.

My God. This is why we read the psalm, or from the book of psalms, that lovely psalm commencing, As the heart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. And then right at the end of the psalm, a wonderful verse for those who are depressed.

Why art thou cast down, O my soul? Why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God. Again, the thought comes through in the 63rd psalm in the first verse. O God, thou art my God.

Early will I seek thee. My soul thirsteth for thee. My flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is.

Thomas Brooke says, If God be thy portion, there is no condition that can make thee miserable. If God be not thy portion, there is no condition that can make thee happy. Paul says, My God, as he's rotting in a Roman dungeon, possibly the cells were below the very palace of Caesar.

And so if one can step back and get a bird's eye view of all that is happening in that particular mammoth building, we first of all see Caesar with all his pomp, with all his wealth, with so many servants and soldiers ready to do his bidding, with all his mistresses aligned and ready for the call of their master. All this taking part on the floor level of the building. And underneath, there is this man in his little cell, probably a malaria infested place, maybe with the rats running to and fro.

And if we were to contrast the disposition of Caesar with that of Paul, if we knew these men really intimately as we can know Paul through his writings, we would come to this phenomenal conclusion that the man who is in the dungeon, the man who's in the subterranean vault, is in a far better circumstance than Caesar with all that he has of this world's goods and this world's so-called entertainment. Paul can speak of the God of the universe and say, My God. And Caesar couldn't do that.

Caesar was spiritually bankrupt, Paul spiritually wealthy. And you know throughout this epistle, the wealth of Paul comes through. He speaks in the first chapter, the seventh verse of my grace.

In the twentieth verse of my hope. In the second chapter, the second verse, my joy. The eighth verse of the third chapter, my Lord.

A spiral staircase of blessing. And at the top, he is able to put, my God. And I say that because he can use such a possessive pronoun and apply it to the Lord.

It indicates the riches that were Paul's and how better off he is than Caesar. Now, take that from the first century and apply it to yourself. Can you say, My God? Is this your God? The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, is he yours? Are you in a faith relationship with him? Then whether your body's wracked with rheumatism, whether your bank balance is at an all-time low, whether things are happening in your family circle that cause you distress, whether you go to your office on Tuesday with worry and with concern as to what lies in store for you there.

Let me underline this truth, that you're better off than the majority of people in this world. Because you can say, My God. Astonishment in that term.

And I say the thought of possession is also obvious. But move on, because there's another thing we detect, and that is the concept of permanency. The concept of permanency.

One of my favorite singers, of whom I have one or two records, or several records, is a lady, a Greek lady by the name of Nana Muscuri. And as very often singers wax eloquent and sometimes in a sentimental fashion, about the loving relationships that should exist between men and women. She, on one occasion, has had a song recorded which, speaking of this sort of thing, says, there's something in this world you can be certain of.

Your love. My love. And Miss Muscuri there, as I say, is suggesting that the love that exists between a man and a woman will go on and on and on and on.

And ideally speaking, it should do. But objectively speaking, it often doesn't. The fires of love seem to die down, and there's no more fuel to rekindle them.

Relationships that once were precious and intimate dissolve and disappear. Ah, but if I can take the words of that secular song and sanctify it from the pulpit this evening, this morning, I say there is one thing in this world we can be certain of, and it's the love of God, shed abroad in our hearts. And the love, therefore, that we have to God.

My God, it speaks of, it speaks of permanency. Who, says the Apostle Paul, shall separate me from the love of God? There is no power in the celestial realm, none on the terrestrial, none in the subterranean world, no power at all that can disarm me from this glorious possession, the love of God, which is revealed in Christ Jesus. His forever, only His.

Who the Lord and me shall part. It's impossible. Impossible once you've been linked up with God through faith in Jesus Christ for anyone to plunder you of that possession.

Ah yes, you can be spiritually negligent and not therefore enjoy all the inheritance that is yours and cash this promise that I'm referring to in this particular chapter of Scripture, but there is none that can take from you the love of God. Here is the concept of permanency. My God, He's mine now, He'll be mine tomorrow, He'll be mine next week, He'll be mine next year, He'll be mine throughout the whole of eternity.

How right then was Martin Luther, you remember in the quote that I've already underlined twice in this series, when he says that all of religion can really be distilled to the thought of personal pronouns. If you can say, my God, you've got smuggled in, enshrined, encapsulated into those two words, all of the doctrines of grace, the great revelation of the Christian faith. My God, amazement there, I say.

There is also the thought of possession, and I've added to it the concept or deduced from it the concept of permanency. But something else that strikes me. My God, it speaks of confidence.

I almost said pride. I have pride in certain things. I have pride in the memory of my father.

I have pride in the thought of my wife. Can I not have pride in the thought of my God? Look at all that He has done, all that He's done for me. I have confidence in this God.

Epaphroditus, you remember, just to fill in the scenery here, has come to the apostle with a love gift from the church at Philippi. Doubtless Lydia, you remember the lady whose heart God touched, whose heart God opened, had been one of the inspirational factors behind this love gift that had been collected at the church. And Epaphroditus has the pleasure of bringing this to Paul.

Possibly in Roman currency it didn't add up to very much. But the apostle is really pleased that these folks have remembered him. And he works as eloquent, and perhaps far more than the actual gift itself deserved.

Because, as I say, it probably wasn't a great amount of money. These Christians, the majority of them were not wealthy. But the apostle is now making this point.

Look, Epaphroditus is your representative, and he's come to me with this gift, and I treasure it. It's some indication of your love and of your affection for me. But let me tell you this, that the Lord Jesus Christ, God's gift to this world, is able to relate to all your need.

You've ministered to me, and that's a good thing. I'm in need here in jail. And Epaphroditus has brought this little love offering from yourselves.

But there are certain things in my life that you can't minister to. But I, and there are certain things in your life that I cannot minister to. But here is the incredible thing.

My God, He shall supply all your need, according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. You see the confidence there. Do you feel confident in your God? Then every time you use this expression, let that intonation come in.

My Lord, my God, the thought of confidence. And then surely, and finally, here the apostle Paul indicates that he wants to recommend this God. My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.

If you say those words, my God, and you've already got in your repetition of them, the various intonations that I've been bringing out, then also included must be this concern to recommend this great God to other people. After all, doesn't that sum up what the apostle has engaged in throughout the whole of his life? And now he's an old man. He speaks of himself as he's writing to Timothy in a later epistle, as Paul the Aged.

He's been engaged in recommending this God throughout his life to men and women in the Roman world. Why do you want to recommend this God, Paul? Well, it's only my God who can supply the needs of other people. And Paul, who was well-versed in the Old Testament scriptures, might have quoted, they that wait upon the Lord shall not like any good thing.

Trust in the Lord and do good, so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be filled. There is no one else that we can recommend as fulfilling the, as able to fulfill the needs of humankind. Oh yes, there are great friendships that one can indulge in and be blessed by, but there's no one who can resolve the inattentions within the personality of ordinary people like you and me.

We've all sinned, we've all come short to the glory of the sovereign Lord of the universe. Now, how as a sinner can I face the future? How can I face death? How can I face standing before this creator of the world? Well, I can't. I can't face it in any confident fashion.

Not unless someone has come along and recommended to me the God of the gospels, the Lord Jesus Christ, the arbiter, the barrister, the advocate, the one who on yonder Calvary's cross took in his own body my sins and was punished in my room and in my stead. But when I know this God, and when I appreciate what this God has done for me, when I realize that he has brought me into a right relationship with the heavenly Father, then I must recommend him. Says the apostle writing in admittedly a different context, but not so removed from that of this verse, to the Gentiles at Rome, he says, I am under obligation to preach the gospel, not only to the Jew, but to the Greek and to the barbarian.

It is my bounden duty. I have to recommend my God around this world. Well then, did you understand that all this was intertwined, was encapsulated within this term? My God, astonishment that he should be yours.

My God, the thought of possession, he belongs to you. My God, this is a permanent relationship. Nobody can rob you of it.

My God, you can be confident in this God. My God, you can recommend him to everyone because of what he has done for you. You remember how to allude to the incident I referred to earlier on at the beginning of my meditation, how Thomas, when he saw the risen Christ, he said, my Lord and my God.

And when the Lord Jesus Christ spoke to Mary in the garden of resurrection, that's early, early that first Sunday morning, she said, go and tell the disciples that I am risen and that I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. How wonderful to realize that the Lord Jesus Christ links us up with his Father and that we're in the same relationship with him as the disciples were of yesteryear. Praise God.

We can refer to the Lord of the universe and we can say from the depths of our heart, my God, amen. And we lift our hearts, our hands and our voices as we rejoice to call you my God. And we bless you, Father, that you belong to us and we belong to you.

And we thank you that we look forward to a future that gets even more and more rosy and wonderful. So Lord, help us to bask in all the meaning of that term as some now take their leave from this sanctuary. And may those who remain know even more of the presence of Jesus when we break bread and drink wine together.

Amen.